Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds has signed a historic bill banning abortions once a fetal heartbeat can be detected, the strongest protection for preborn children in the U.S. Two other states, North Dakota and Arkansas, passed heartbeat/first trimester preborn protection bills in previous years, but unfortunately, those bills were blocked by the courts.

Reynolds, who has stated that she is “100 percent pro-life,” affirmed her position on the issue: “I’m pro-life. I’m proud to be pro-life. I’ve made that very clear,” Reynolds told the Chicago Tribune.

Live Action President Lila Rose praised the passage of the bill, noting that the measure is in line with science and reason:

“This law acknowledges the scientific fact that the pro-abortion movement tries desperately to ignore: This is a unique, individual human life in the womb, not a ‘clump of cells,’ Rose said, ‘and just three weeks after fertilization, the child’s little heart is already beating. It’s time for society and our laws to acknowledge that there are two human beings in a pregnancy, and both deserve protection.”

The bill is a step in the right direction; however, it unfortunately contains exceptions for rape and incest. Earlier this week, the Iowa House passed the measure in a vote of 51-46 and the Senate followed just hours later in the early morning on May 2, 2018, with a vote of 27-19.

A University of Oxford study showed that a preborn child’s heart, originally thought to begin beating at 3 weeks, may actually begin to beat around 16 days gestation. Iowa is now the safest state in the nation for preborn children.